Festivals and Public Events

Festivals, workshops, talks and public lectures provide opportunities to showcase the range of subjects and activities taking place in academic institutions whilst making informal but valuable contributions to education. Particularly in the area of science and environment, funding bodies are placing greater emphasis on outreach to promote public awareness and understanding both of the results and the wider relevance of the work being undertaken.  Festivals can vary greatly in size and scope but will feature a variety of events - for example, a series of lectures, with topics ranging from cutting-edge research to unusual perspectives on science, or curriculum-linked workshops providing hands-on activities for students and teachers. We've listed some useful resources to help you with your planning.

The NCCPE is hosting a Good Practice Workshop on universities engagement in festivals. We are keen to involve anyone with expertise in running or participating in events. Find out more here.

Communications Toolkit: Events

The ESRC's Communications Toolkit is an online resource to help researchers produce effective communications about their work.  The Events section covers all aspects of staging an event, from running small workshops to organising large scale conferences.  The practical module guides you through all aspects of planning an event from choosing the venue and caterers to designing the programme, liaising with speakers and delegates, selecting audio-visual requirements, marketing the event and producing a post-conference report.  It will be useful to people who are managing an event for the first time or who do not have the budget to hire conference organisers to do the work for them.

Regional Festivals and Events Toolkit

One North East Tourism's event management toolkit is primarily aimed at people in the North East of England.  However, the Information Sheets section provides a comprehensive set of guidance notes that are a valuable resource for any event organiser.  As well as providing clear guidance on how to go about the various stages in the process, from planning, financing, marketing, health and safety and legal issues, to managing people, there are also links to sample documents to give examples on information to include and how to lay it out.  There are also templates which can be adapted and tailored to your own event.  The Information Sheets are accessible to everyone, whether this is the first event you have ever staged or you are a seasoned event organiser.

Festivals Toolkit for Derbyshire

The toolkit covers all stages of festival management from developing the initial concept through to the evaluation.  It's stuffed full of advice and information, tips and guidance and is really easy to navigate.  There are lots of resources contained in the Toolkit, including downloads, contacts, grass roots advice and examples of good practice derived from seasoned festival organisers.  Whether you need help with marketing, ticketing, health & safety, or even your constitution, you will find something in the Toolkit that will be of interest to you.

Wales Tourist Board: Festival and Events Toolkit

WTB's comprehensive toolkit will save you time, act as an aide-memoire to keep you on track, and give you the practical information needed to run an efficient and professionally organised event.  The TIMELINE concept uses checklists to guide you through all the planning and organisational elements in sequence, with templates for you to download and modify to suit your event.  Nearly all eventualities involved in organising an event are covered.  There are also up-to-date case studies, a comprehensive regional contact list and many checklists designed to make your job easier.  The toolkit is also available in Welsh.

Accessible Events: A good practice guide for staff organising events in Higher Education

This document aims to support staff working in higher education who are involved in the planning, organising, publicising and running of events.  The guidance provided highlights how events and their associated documents can be delivered in a manner that is accessible to disabled people.  Each section ends with an invaluable checklist that can be incorporated into existing event management systems.

Organising a schools-based consensus conference

This information pack was developed after the the first UK school-based conference was organised by the Institute of Food Research and Maiden Erlegh School in Reading, Berkshire, during February and March 1996 as part of the Institute's contribution to activities for the national week of science, engineering and technology (SET96) in March 1996. Science and arts school students studying at A level were challenged to think through the ethical, practical and economic issues surrounding food biotechnology.